Question

I have an array with multiple values called $my_replacements.

I have a string called $my_string.

I want to be able to iterate over $my_replacements and perform a preg_replace on $my_string, so right now I have this:

foreach($my_replacements as $replacement) {
    preg_replace($replacement, '', $my_string);
}

This works fine, but I would just like the loop to stop when a replacement is done to $my_string, and when that happens I want to get the value of this new $my_string with the value replaced out of it.

How would I do that?

Answer 1

You need to compare the result with the string before replacing something:

foreach($my_replacements as $replacement) {
     $new_string = preg_replace($replacement, '', $my_string);
     if($new_string !== $my_string) {
         break;
     }
}

From the docs:

If matches are found, the new subject will be returned, otherwise subject will be returned unchanged or NULL if an error occurred.

If this is not the case, we break, i.e. exit the loop.